Is Roon worth it just to play Tidal only?

I’ll say I think it’s worth it. My proof is that when my NAS powers down for some reason, I often go days without noticing because I listen to just streaming on Roon, daily and for much of the day. Now it’s true that I have both Qobuz & Tidal and I have enough genre diversity in what I listen to that I feel like both are justified - I often listen to albums that are only in one or the other. But I need Roon for both discovery and for managing the high absolute amount of overlap. But I do also have a decent sized local collection, so I can’t really tell you whether it’s worth it to you. And no one can. I bought lifetime back in the day (Not at the the OG price, I’m newer than that), and while it’s justified now that that is in the rear view mirror, I’m sure I suffer from confirmation bias just like anyone else would. So all I can say is best of luck on your decision.

To me as a Tidal only user these are the points that made Roon worthwhile to go lifetime:

  • Control of playback through multiple devices at the same time. Sitting at my Mac I can control the music. Switching to my couch I can control it via iPad, iPhone etc.

  • Tagging is a feature that grows on me more and more. I have a Tag “Shopping Cart” that I use like I went to a store and bought Albums I’d like to try and to find the newly ‘bought’ stuff quickly. A tag “Recommendations” if someone recommends music to me or I find stuff online via youtube etc.

  • DSP features like volume leveling that is sometimes handy in playlists for example when the volume is all over the place.

  • I have downloaded some youtube videos where I only use the audio and those I have imported in Roon with a nice Picture and the artist. Its like as if that audio piece is hosted on tidal directly. So local stuff is well integrated.

  • The connections Roon makes when you dig into stuff is amazing. Switching back to Tidal yesterday made it obvious that this feature would be sorely missed if I needed to go back to Tidal.

  • Being able to stream via the RAAT protocol and not use Air Play anymore

  • I’m planning to use convolution filters to improve acoustics in my room or at least to try it out.

  • Being able to set volume levels that won’t be jumped over by a software bug gives me and my cats peace of mind to not accidentally get blasted by 250 Watts.

  • Roon Radio is really good when it learned what I like and don’t like

  • All the information about artists, albums etc. proofed useful and interesting numerous times. That is inside Tidal as well but laborious to use in my opinion.

  • No need to have anymore hardware besides a Roon Ready (Hegel) Amp. The capability I have with just one box is simply amazing. (I already had the MacBook I’m using as the Roon Server)

After having tried out ARC I really really hope that this will some day replace the current Roon software on iOS because it makes use of native animations and UI stuff and that makes it pretty as hell :smiley:
Only thing missing there is RAAT protocol support and an iPad version.

I bet I’ll encounter more benefits the longer I’ll use Roon.

Sure there are things that could use improvement like how the Playlists are displayed (should be exactly like on Tidal and Spotify) but all in all I don’t want to miss Roon anymore.

5 Likes

Old post but same for me, listening bluetooth to H95 headphones I dont know if Roon sounds better but its definitely louder playing the same track from the same source (Tidal) using Roon. I have no EQ on. Now it bums me out because its more enjoyable listening to the H95’s at decent volume using Roon than Tidal app but I cant take Roon out of house. I wish I could get the Tidal app to sound like Roon.

Roon ARC will let you do just that. Access your Roon Server through both WiFi and cellular. I am using it to listen to Roon while at work 42 km away from home.

Install the Roon ARC app on your phone and then you’ll need to setup Roon ARC itself on your Roon Server in Roon’s settings. You might have to head into your router’s settings though as ARC can be a pain in the behind to get it running.

1 Like